Fire
by purrfect
Summary: A human mage finds herself consumed by the past and threatened by the future.
1. Chapter 1

Present:

The fire burns within me, a hot, searing flame, curling my duty, my memories, my pain at the edges, not dulling but brightening them, driving me before them fast and hard, as if the very demons of the Nether nipped at my heels. Perhaps they do, for nothing seems able to cool the burn, not the gentle, understanding touch of my husband, the flickering flutter of Ailin's delicate dragon wings, the soft chitter of Pippen's prairie dog voice, the playful nudge of Speck's large, dog nose or the sloppy lick of tiny Flick's lolling pink puppy tongue. These are my beloved, those I take with me as I abandon the cold snap of duty and the overwhelming flood of needs that were not my own.

Standing now at the peak of the Twin Colossals in Feralas, not far in place but ever so distant in understanding from the Masque, I smile and turn to watch my family lying among the grasses, playing an odd sort of tag under the watchful, careful eyes of my husband. He somehow feels me watching him and looks up, his stern, ageless face softening into that smile that's just mine, just for me, just because he knows I need it, need him, need this sort of exile I've taken us on. He knew, perhaps before I did, that I was stifling in the cool stone hall guarded by the great green dragon, slowly drowning under the weight of a duty I accepted much too soon.

Restless suddenly, I curl my fingers into my itching palms, fighting the need to set something aflame, to watch it burn as the thing inside of me burns, twisting to get out. That it were a true demon, a true spirit and not something of mine, something inside of me that has shifted, changed, perhaps not for the better, I wish for in private but do not say aloud. Steadfast has watched me twist myself into knots over such things among my friends; that I might want something that sinister for myself is something I can't bring myself to tell him. As his smile slides into a worried, thoughtful expression, the light in his eyes dimming just a little, I wonder if perhaps he already knows.

A distance is growing between us, a chasm that becomes harder to span everyday. Always it is this way with me, this slow widening of the gap between what I hope and what my magic demands. The very real possibility that this love, too, shall die only adds to my worry and fear. The worry and fear feed the fire. It is a cycle part of me is afraid to break, afraid that in the breaking, I will break myself.

A playful tug on the hem of my pants has me glancing down into the excited, adoring eyes of Flick. The little worg has fallen in love me just as I have with him, this puppy that is both sweet-tempered and mischievous. Reaching down, I pluck him up, cuddling him in my arms, burying my nose in his ruff and inhaling the fresh scents of grass and damp fur. I have the fierce hope that he will never outgrow me, never outgrow this need he has to be stroked and petted and loved. He snuggles closer, burying his cool puppy nose in the curve of my neck, comforting as he is comforted, loving as he is loved.

Not to be outdone, warned only by the flickering sound of wings and a hushed chitter, I am set upon by Ailin and Pippen, the latter purring in his strange, dragonling way as Pippen dances about my legs. We fall to the ground in a tangle of hair, fur and laughter. A shadow falls over us; when I look up, Steadfast is smiling once again, both he and his large, fierce worg Speck sinking down to lie with us in the grass, Steadfast's head on my belly, Speck's cool nose in my neck, the smaller animals snuggled in as close as they can get.

Within minutes, everyone but me is asleep.

One of my hands is buried in the long fall of my husband's snow-white hair. The other, slender and pale, is lifted over my head, contrasting sharply with the bright blue of the Feralas sky. I turn it slowly to and fro, watching the flame within my palm burn, flickering malevolently red and orange and red again. It is the color of my hair, the color of my pain, the color of my life.

Past:

_I am five. I know this only because it is the reason my sister says I must stay home with Papa while she and Mother travel into the City to see our grandparents._

"_I am eight," she says in that lofty way she has that makes me want to pinch her, her honey-blonde locks curled carefully about her dimpled cheeks, her mouth in a little moue as she looks down on me from her extra inches. "You are only five and you dirtied your best dress playing with the chickens. Mama says you have to stay with Father but that I may have ice cream if I am good."_

_Part of me wants to cry and plead with Mother to take me with her, as ice cream sounds terribly exciting and the idea of the City and wistful way Mother speaks of it make me want to go. The other part, the one that is the image of the tall man who is my sire right down to the flame of my hair, is quite content to lean back against Papa's knee where he is checking the harness on old Seraph one last time. The horse stands patiently, his eyes cloudy with age, his back slightly bowed from pulling the heavy plow. He whickers softly as I lay my tiny hand on his side but I am not afraid, for he is only saying hello and goodbye. He, like my Papa, is infinitely patient with the hurried patter of my feet at his heels and the high-pitched, quick staccato of my speech._

_Mother, looking like an imposing stranger in her fine cloak of deepest green, does not pause to kiss either Papa or myself as she sweeps up into the carriage. Arranging her little hat with a careful pat, she folds her hands in her lap and keeps her eyes turned carefully forward, her mouth compressed into a tight, hard line. _

_As Papa steps away to help Rachel into the carriage, I frown, my hands dropping to twist nervously in the skirt of my dress; Mother has that look most often when I have done something to displease her. She says nothing, however, only nods curtly to Papa as she picks up the reins and clicks her tongue at Seraph. With a last whicker and a glance back at Papa and I, he sets off down the dusty road. We stand there for a long while, Papa and I, until his big hand gently squeezes my shoulder._

"_Little bit, you still need to feed the chickens. If you manage it quick, fast and in a hurry, I'll let you help me in the garden."_

_A thrill runs through me for, aside from the chickens who peck at my bare feet and make me giggle with their odd strut, helping Papa in the garden is my most favorite job. He doesn't mind that I dig in the dirt with my hands or plop down in the middle of the row of corn to daydream; he just seems happy for my company, his deep voice rising and falling as he croons to his plants, singing songs of his own childhood. He laughs when I try to sing with him or when I bobble the little watering can, drenching myself and making a mud hole worthy of the hogs._

_Nodding up at him, I rush off to get the feed from the barn and then hurry even faster to the henhouse, the little can that looks big in my hands bumping against my skinny legs. It rattles and I am humming tunelessly along with it as I rush into the enclosure, thinking five minutes ahead to when I will be patting the dirt around another seed._

_It is my favorite hen, the one I have named Pick, that I nearly stumble over in my haste. I stare at her for a long moment, not quite sure why her pretty little head with it's proud red cockle is tilted at such an angle, or why there is a red, oozing mess where her bright white feathers used to be._

Present:

The flame in my palm has spread up my arm, lapping at my bare skin. I am hypnotized by its searing flame and by the heat and pain I somehow don't feel. I wonder idly how long it might take for the fire to consume my body and, if in the end, I would even feel it. Steadfast stirs, moving away from me in his sleep, and the flames leap higher.

Past:

_I think it must be my high-pitched, endless scream that brings Papa to the henhouse. His face, broad and kind, sunburnt from his labours, is pasty white, his large, work-roughened hands skimming over my small body, trembling as they attempt to find my hurt. It is all I can do to stand there, to not wrench away from the person who understands me best in the world. _

"_Little bit! Little bit!" When I can respond only with another wail, he shakes me, but gently, his voice sharper than I have ever heard it. "Keelyn Marie Mulally, you answer me right this minute!"_

_Somehow, I manage to turn, extending one trembling finger in the direction of the henhouse, unable to do more, unable to articulate what I have seen, what has happened…what I have done. The best I can do is choke back the wailing, to swallow it like a thick, heavy lump that lodges somewhere near my heart. Holding me close, he turns to the henhouse, stepping first to the doorway and then inside. I bury my face against his leg, unable to look._

_The word he breathes under his breath, a curse that sounds more like a quick prayer, makes me wince and increases my trembling, for I can see what he sees without needing to look._

_Where once a handsome and sly fox stood, rooting in the nests of my beloved chickens, is now a pile of skin and bones and fur and flame. Flames the red-gold of my hair._

Present:

The fire burns both within me and without. I do not know that there is a way to control it.

I do not know that I wish to control it.

I do not know if they can ever forgive me for embracing the flames.


	2. Chapter 2

_Past:_

_I am sitting on the top rail of the log fence, swinging my legs to and fro as my sister flounces out of the house with yet another bandbox. Her look is both contemptuous and needy, a silent plea that I help her with her things even as it takes me to task for such an unladylike action a sitting on the fence. At twelve, I know that I should help her, as we are being sent away on this exile, if not together, at least not wholly separate. The part of me that loves my sister with a bright, shining fierceness feels a pang of guilt. The part of me that resents that while not only has she _chosen _ to go away to school while I am being sent under protest but that she is also being given the choice of studying where she would like while I am being sent to a school that is both foreign to my nature and to my "ablitites" keeps me planted firmly on the top rung of the split rail fence. I manage a scathing, superior look that has her pretty mouth drawing up into a sneer that ruins the gentle, round beauty of her china-doll face. I have opened my mouth to say something unwise when a hand lands on my shoulder._

_The hand is slender, long-fingered but not delicate, a woman's hand with carefully buffed nails and well-tended cuticles, the fingertips only slightly callused from her years as a farmer's wife. I stiffen but, to perhaps both my surprise and her own, she says nothing about the unspoken messages that have just passed between my sister and me; instead, her hand squeezes my shoulder gently. When I lift my face I find her dark blue eyes regarding me thoughtfully but not, as is her usual way, with any sort of judgment. There is a look there of sadness, a flicker of regret in the eyes that are so like my own, the blue a clear, bright color that can conceal more, perhaps, than should be possible. I am caught in that look, caught by the sudden need to have my mother understand me, to want the same things for me that I desperately want for myself. Before my desperation spills out into pleas, before I can beg to not be sent away to the City, before I can beg to not be punished for wanting to go to Dalaran, for wanting my magic, for wanting to be _me_, my Mother has turned away from me and called to my sister. Her hand slips from my shoulder and I am left, bereft and wanting, my hands clenching hard about the fence._

_For a moment, the smell of burning wood fills my nostrils._

Present:

"But there's no need for _you_ to go There are thousands of members of the Argent Dawn who are fit for this mission!"

Several of the mounts in the stalls stir restively, their high spirits disturbed by my strident, angry voice, by the quick tap tap of my boots as I pace the length of the stable's central corridor and back again. Steadfast, however, simply continues the slow, methodical checking of his saber's tack, his ageless Kaldorei eyes on his task rather than on me. He doesn't even bother to jump when a flash of fire flares mere centimeters from the toe of his boot.

"Keelyn. I'm going." His voice is a quiet snap, holding a coldness that has never, not until now, not until recently, been directed toward me. When his eyes lift to mine, when I see that the coldness burns clean through, I shiver and my heart, already hurting, simply breaks.

"Then take me with you." I wince at the plea in my own voice, knowing my need is naked upon my face, hating both him and myself for putting it there.

Though his face doesn't soften and the cool look of distance remains in his eyes, he steps toward me, lifting his hand. Pain flickers across his face, pain and defeat and a weary sort of understanding, when I step back, shaking my head. He has seen the flames in my eyes, seen the way I am opening and closing my hands. He knows I am feeling the itch in my palms that means another episode, another night spent with the fire rather than with my husband and he knows, just as I do, that the chasm that started as a crack has widened into a hole that neither of us are equipped to bridge.

He turns away from me and steps over to gather up his bow and quiver where they lean against a stall, his voice no longer cold but simply weary. "Keelyn, you are a danger to any hunting party this way. I need to be focused on rescuring the agent of the Dawn that has been captured, as is my duty and my pledge. You would only be a distraction."

He is right and I know it, know that he is not deliberately trying to hurt me but both my heart and my pride rebel. Before I can stop it, before really I'm even aware of it happening, my hands have burst into flame. When I lift them before my face, staring at them with both chagrin and fascination, I see that he is watching me, his face impassive. There is not really judgment there but I feel it in my own heart, feel the pain of our separation as anger and betrayal and abandonment rather than an effect of my own stubborness. Before I have even managed to recognize my own thoughts and feelings and to understand them, before I give us both a chance to save the marriage we cherish, my voice snaps out, fast and hard and brittle. The words are unforgivable.

"Don't come back."

_Past:_

_It is the first time that I have truly understood what it means to be alone._

_Three weeks have passed since Papa pressed a gentle kiss to my forehead while Mother fussed with her hat, reminding him that they must see about getting a new blade for the plow before they left the City. Certainly it was a different scene than the one that played out at the Monastery where Rachel clung to Mother, crying the fat tears that somehow made neither her face nor her eyes red while Papa squeezed my hand and smiled down into my face. However, the differences in my parents' affections for their daughters is the farthest thing from my mind as I dump books and paper and quill and ink atop my desk, scattering them about before I fall backwards onto the tiny bed. My squeal is one of pure joy, for my blessings are many in this place._

_I have my own room! Small, to be sure, with little space to move between trunk and bed and writing desk, but mine to do with as I please when I am not studying. There is no sister or roommate or nosy parent to rifle through my things, looking for contraband books or ill-used clothing. Though of course there are teachers here, they have promised to let us keep our rooms private, our own little sanctuaries from their constant and demanding attention._

_And the classes themselves! The dance I do is a puppy-like wiggle of my bottom against the bed, a rapturous sigh escaping my lips. There are no books here I am not allowed to touch, no subject that is off-limits. no question considered too simple or too complex. There is no one here to belittle me or mock me if I must speak words aloud to understand their meaning, no one here to get impatient when the letters, seeming of their own volition, get turned around and upside down. I set the pace for when and how and what I wish to learn._

_And the magic! Everywhere, anywhere I turn someone is doing some sort of magic, whether it be turning a full trough of water turned into a solid sheet of ice or turning one sort of animal into another and then back again, without harm. The fire magic here, though, is less wild than my own, contained and sporadic. I am told I may learn it if I wish but in a contemptuous tone of voice, as if fire magic is not true magic._

_Oh, oh, but it doesn't matter, it _ doesn't_, because I can learn here, I can do here, I can _ be_ here._

_Whether Mother will ever know it or not, she has done the first and only thing for which I will ever thank her: she has given me a place where I can be myself._

Present:

I shut the heavy wooden front door firmly behind me, sliding the latch home with a sharp _click_ that echoes in the silence of the little glade. As my hand slips away, a woman's hand with carefully buffed nails and well-tended cuticles, the fingertips only slightly callused from my work with sword and staff and dagger and magic, I glance up at the highest window. There is nothing to show that it was once the bedroom I shared with my husband, that once I felt safe and whole and loved in that little garret with its hand-carved bed and cheerful grate; instead, the edges of the window are blackened with soot, the glass of the window bubbled and distorted.

There is nothing on my face save a careful blankness, an emptiness, as I turn from the home Steadfast and I have made and climb into the saddle. Niall, my restive and restless warhorse, stirs beneath me and I pat him absently, slapping the reins against his neck. He sets off at a fast trot, unconcerned with both the weight of the heavy saddlebags or really even with my direction. Neither of us look back.

It has been three weeks. My husband has not returned, though his hunting party has long since managed its goal of rescuing the woman from the depths of Stratholme and been lauded as heroes before being sent right back into duty. He has not returned and now no longer can I feel safe and loved and understood.

I have truly been left with the cold comfort of my magic.


End file.
